When the ruling class in the Twenty-Six Counties wants something bad
enough it will do pretty much anything to get it. This is one of the
main lessons to be taken out of Saturday’s result on the second Lisbon
referendum.

For working people in Ireland and around Europe the result was, frankly,
not a good one. On a turnout of 58 per cent of the Twenty-Six County
electorate, the Lisbon Treaty was passed with a ‘Yes’ vote of 67 per
cent.

After ripping up the result of the first Lisbon referendum because they
didn’t like the result, the Twenty-Six County government, the official
‘opposition’, IBEC, the state and corporate media, all the main churches
and, shamefully, most of the trade union hierarchy spent months and
million of euros spreading fear and peddling lies. Who said class was
dead?

Those who run the Twenty-Six Counties in the interests of the rich
removed the mask of political pluralism and gave public opinion both
barrels. Even the leaders of the main universities in the Twenty-Six
Counties warned students and staff that voting ‘No’ would impact
negatively on ERASMUS programmes. It was one of those rare moments where
the vested interests of those who are really in charge stood naked for
all to see.

Yet, despite the fear-mongering and the threats from the business class,
33 per cent of those who voted, 504,606 people, stood firm and voted No.
On top of that figure there is the 42 per cent of the electorate who
didn’t cast a vote. How many of those hundreds of thousands of working
people concluded there was no point voting No to Lisbon 2 because of
what happened to Lisbon 1?

Those who did vote No again, concentrated in the working class, the
exploited, the neglected and the ignored, provide the potential for a
radical grassroots movement for revolutionary change in Irish society.
Those Irish citizens who were denied the right to vote - the people in
the occupied Six Counties - provide equal potential for the building of
such a movement.

Speaking on TV3 after the result was confirmed, Fianna Fail’s Conor
Lenihan feigned great offence at the suggestion that his party, Fine
Gael and the Labour Party collectively represent the interests of the
ruling class in the Twenty-Six Counties. In their strenuous efforts to
get the Lisbon Treaty passed, however, Mr Lenihan and his ‘opponents’
may just have confirmed that fact in the public mind, once and for all.

Despite the Lisbon result, things are slowly changing in Irish society
and it’s not the sort of change that, when it comes to fruition, will
suit the agendas of Fianna Fail, IBEC & Co.

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